Alexsey Belan, who is at the center of the U.S. allegations, has been named in two prior federal indictments dating back to 2012

U.S. authorities said Russian intelligence officers backed the massive 2014 hack against Yahoo Inc., but the hacker at the center of the allegations is a 29-year-old who has eluded Western law-enforcement agencies for several years.

Alexsey Belan, a Latvian-born Russian national, has been named in two prior U.S. federal indictments for crimes dating back to 2012. Contents of those charges haven’t been disclosed until this week, but...

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